Food For Thought: To Academy Awards Watchers.

By Jerry Alatalo | March 10, 2024

The red carpets are brand new and rolled out, the “stars” are gathered, identifying the excessively expensive designer gowns’ creators is the focus during the preliminary Hollywood idol-worship ceremonies, the (most expensive) champagne for the after parties is nicely chilling, and billions around the world will, once again, watch the 96th Annual Academy Awards.

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Here is my comment at Off Guardian, in response to Edward Curtin’s latest writing:

“…by U.S. weapons produced in clean factories by people just doing their jobs and collecting their pay at “defense” contractors Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Pfizer, etc….”

Imagine that Jackson Pollock (or Jackson Bollock) were still alive and the author of the previous sentence instead of Mr. Curtin, and the words were paints haphazardly splashed upon the canvas in Pollock’s nauseating style.

Those in the so-called “art industry” whose jobs require them to discern artists’ hidden messages (art critics etc.) for others would be spared the mentally torturous detective task, and easily, immediately identify the obvious, bright neon sign/message, blinking with near-blinding brilliance, on and off from face of the canvas:

“The deadly dangerous mRNA injections are military biological weapons created for the sole eugenics purpose of killing human beings and other purposes …

“The deadly dangerous mRNA injections are military biological weapons created for the sole eugenics purpose of killing human beings and other purposes …

“The deadly dangerous mRNA injections are military biological weapons created for the sole eugenics purpose of killing human beings and other purposes.”

The message inside Mr. Curtin’s abstract painting leads to the prosecutions of those who ordered the (ongoing) covert biological warfare operation conducted secretly across the Earth; the sober prosecutions are conducted in courtrooms across the world, drawing comparisons to the historic, immeasurably important post-World War II Nuremberg Trials.

After the ruthless power-and-control-crazed mass murderers were (rightly) found guilty and removed from society, all nations moved forward and signed on to an international treaty stipulating that possession of nuclear weapons is an international crime punishable by death, and the hideous creations – having the sole criminally insane purpose of killing millions of human beings – were finally, and forever, banished from the face of the Earth.

Sales of Leo Tolstoy’s nonfiction book, “What Is Art?”, described by Mohandes Gandhi as “Tolstoy’s masterpiece”, break all previous sales records in the nonfiction category.

Tolstoy wrote in What Is Art?: “Art is a human activity, whose purpose is the transmission of the highest and best feelings to which men have attained.”

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And the world lived happily ever after.

Amen.

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There’s always the possibility Oscar winners (“Oppenheimer” has been nominated in 13 categories, the most for 2023 movies) in their acceptance speeches will say something akin to/resembling Tolstoy’s “transmission of the highest and best feelings to which men have attained”; it’s reasonable to suggest most viewers tune in with hopes of catching one or more of those far-too-rare instances in Academy Awards history.  

We’re about to find out. Raise the curtain (or is it “raise the Curtin”?). 

The show must go on.

Peace. 

 

Sick, and Sick of It All

Healing Music in the River of Time.

By Jerry Alatalo | December 26, 2023

“Art is a human activity, whose purpose is the transmission of the highest and best feelings to which men have attained.” – LEO TOLSTOY, Russian writer, What is Art? (1898)

While trying to decide whether warning people about 1) the mRNA injections mass murderers still freely walking the Earth or 2) the dangerous signs of military escalation to potential World War III due to provocation in the form of genocide of the Palestinian people, we happened to come across the deeply spiritual music of Native American artist Bill Miller.

Deciding to share a recent excellent concert performed by Bill Miller came as a natural thing to do – instead of one more post on eugenicist mass murderers still freely walking the Earth or the very real potential of World War III soon occurring, sparked by the (intentionally provocative) merciless genocide of the Palestinian people – particularly when viewed from the perspective that what is now occurring, what humanity is witnessing and experiencing on Earth, is arguably the greatest spiritual war ever fought by humanity, at any moment in the River of Time (World History).

What Bill Miller’s music offers people is a firm spiritual foundation, a potent injection of spiritual power, if you will, for the Earth’s warriors of light, fighting the good fight, from that spiritual place – on the right side of history. 

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Description of Bill Miller’s concert at Freedom Square:

Three-time Grammy award winning musician Bill Miller of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohicans, a living legend living life—stronger with a renewed focus on healing through song, art, and storytelling–returns to his ancestral homeland at Freedom Square for a community-based gathering rooted in connections through food. A Mohican Indian from northern Wisconsin, Bill Miller has long been one of the most admired figures in the Native American music arena and beyond.

As an award-winning recording artist, performer, songwriter, activist, and painter, he’s been a voice for the voiceless, a link between two great and clashing civilizations. The Mohican/Munsee lands extended across six states from southwest Vermont, the entire Hudson river valley of New York from Lake Champlain to Man­hattan, western Massachusetts up to the Connecticut River valley, Northwest Connecticut, and portions of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. In September 1609, Henry Hudson–a trader for the Dutch–sailed up the Mahicannituck into the lands of the Mohicans. He found himself in an area rich in beaver and otter, the kinds of furs the Dutch most coveted.

By 1614 a Dutch trading post was established on an island later named Castle Island. As the fur trade expanded and furs became more difficult to find, tensions developed between the Mohicans and the Mohawks, Haudenosaunee people to the west. Each group wanted to maintain its share of the fur trade business, as well as retain friendly relations with their European allies. Not only did conflicts occur between the Mahicans and the Mohawks, but the Native people also were caught in wars among the Dutch, English and French.

The Mohicans were eventually driven from their territory west of the Mahicannituck. In the early 1700’s, indebtedness, questionable land purchases and cultural conflicts caused them to move farther east near the Housatonic River in what were to become Massachusetts and Connecticut.

The Sanctuary for Independent Media is a telecommunications production facility dedicated to community media arts, located in an historic former church near the confluence of the Hudson (Mahicannituc) and Mohawk Rivers, in the New York Capital Region. The Sanctuary hosts screening, production, and performance facilities, as well as trainings in media production. It is also a physical resource, as it acts as a meeting space for artists, activists, and independent media makers of all kinds.

We use art, science, and participatory action to promote social and environmental justice, and freedom of creative expression. The Sanctuary for Independent Media celebrated its ninth “StoryHarvest,” a celebration of music, community, food and storytelling, Saturday, September 23 at Freedom Square (the mystical intersection where 6th Avenue turns into 5th Avenue at 101st Street in Troy NY). This event is part of the Sanctuary Eco-Art Trail project, connecting Indigenous legacy with environmental justice.

The Sanctuary Eco-Art Trail is located on a block-wide environmental campus in North Central on settler lands. Part of the river’s historic flood plain and home to significant Mohican cultural sites, this neighborhood is also one of the neediest in New York State, with a long history of disinvestment and environmental contamination.

The Eco-Art Trail acknowledges these layered histories as we dream and build towards restored biocultural diversity and robust Indigenous futures. The Sanctuary Eco-Art Trail is supported from an “Our Town” Creative Placemaking grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, in partnership with the Stockbridge-Munsee Community (Tribe).

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May the Great Spirit bless you with the spiritual power necessary for fighting and winning the Good Fight.

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(Thank you to mediasanctuary at YouTube and thank you to true artist Bill Miller.)